


my father comes and he goes

by mjolnirbreaker



Category: Stranger Things (TV 2016)
Genre: Absent Parents, Graduation, Light Angst, Multi, Prom, drug mention
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-25
Updated: 2019-05-25
Packaged: 2020-03-17 00:22:00
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,891
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18954115
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mjolnirbreaker/pseuds/mjolnirbreaker
Summary: So, for Max, he doesn’t punch Billy Fucking Hargrove. He just sits there in sweltering heat and listens to the C’s being announced, and when parents cheer for their kids he tries not to think about how his parents are currently in Colorado.





	my father comes and he goes

**Author's Note:**

  * For [floralathena](https://archiveofourown.org/users/floralathena/gifts).



Steve always expected to take Nancy Wheeler to prom. He never expected to also take Jonathan Byers. He definitely never expected to have plans directly afterwards that involved getting dinner with a bunch of thirteen-year-olds instead of finding the best party and getting wasted. 

And yet here he is, suit on, hair perfect, weird flower thing pinned to his jacket, all of those things going on. It’s actually the most excited he’s ever been to go to a stupid high school function. 

“So this means we don’t have to go next year, right?” Jonathan asks while he pretends not to struggle with his tie. Nancy had warned him against undoing it in the car on the ride over and he had agreed not to for two minutes before eventually pulling it off. Steve thinks he may actually be biologically programmed against dressing up. 

“Well it might be fun.” Nancy reasons. When she moves to help him with the tie, which is now somehow knotted at the opposite end, her dress sparkles and her hair bounces and Steve honestly thinks he might pass out. Her dress is this dark pink, almost a red but not quite. Joyce had called it _garnet_ which he thinks is a rock. Whatever the fuck it’s called doesn’t matter because the dress itself isn’t beautiful, it’s Nancy that makes it beautiful. 

And now that Jonathan has his tie fixed and his jacket sleeves still pushed up to his elbows because some things can’t be helped, he looks perfect too. Their suits are practically identical but Jonathan pulls it off a million times better than Steve. 

“It _will_ be fun,” Steve assures them, snapping out of his admiration haze just fast enough to avoid missing his opportunity to make a joke, “but next year won’t be because you won’t have me.”

“Yeah, Nance. Don’t you know there’s no point in prom if you aren’t personally escorted by the prom king himself?”

“Gross, shut up.” Steve groans. The one part of the night that he doesn’t want to think about is the whole king/queen business. He’s hoping and praying with every fiber of his being that Billy Fucking Hargrove just wins it, and he probably would if it weren’t for the several bets placed on Steve winning all the way back in September before Billy came to Hawkins and took his meaningless approval points. People might like Billy more than Steve now, but they like money more than both of them. 

The odds point to Steve having to get up on stage and get his hair all messed up by a cheap plastic crown while he pretends to be happy about it and take a picture with either Angela Kennedy or Lillian Vera, depending on whoever wore the hottest swimsuit at the last party of the summer in August and therefore locked down the most bets. 

“What’re you going to do if you win?” Nancy asks as they officially lock the car and start making their way through the parking lot. 

“Hmm. Probably take my top off.”

It’s actually fun. They spend more time watching people who clearly drank before coming try to dance than actually dancing. They complain about the shitty food and remind each other every five minutes that after this they’ll have double layer burgers from Benny’s with heavenly melted cheese and the saltiest fries on the planet. They do the stupid photo booth because it’s the only place with enough privacy besides the bathroom for them to kiss without raising questions. 

Steve holds the photo strip, which is just blurry pictures of them kissing and laughing about how bad the photos are going to turn out, in his pocket while he goes up to the stage to be crowned. Nancy and Jonathan are standing in the crowd watching him, Jonathan giving him a thumbs-up and Nancy sarcastically curtseying with a lift of her dress which he can see sparkling from all the way up on stage. 

The crown is plastic, painted in a dull gold that doesn’t really reflect light and actually looks more brown, but it looks pretty good when they both try it on in the car afterwards. Unfortunately Steve promised the kids they could have it for Dungeons and Dragons prop usage, otherwise he’d keep it and put it on Nancy and Jonathan when they’re least suspecting it. 

“My mom was her prom queen.” Lucas says while he steals a fry from Steve’s plate despite already having a pile of his own. They’re taking up two tables in Benny’s, which the kids had shoved together completely oblivious of the collective wince of everyone else in the restaurant when the floor and metal screeched together. Lucas now steals a fry from Mike, who’s too occupied with helping El operate the ketchup bottle to defend his plate. “She said it made all of high school worth it.”

“Yeah, my mom was too.” Steve says. The crown is on the table, the opaque paint just barely able to mirror his face. His mother’s crown had been huge, actual metal, with rhinestones in it. He had seen pictures in her old yearbook. Her date was his father, who won prom king alongside her, and the black-and-white pictures captured their genuine happiness, an emotion which is now entirely foreign to his parents. Steve was young when they looked through the yearbook together. He’d proudly proclaimed that someday he’d be prom king, and then he’d marry whoever the queen was just like them. 

Now he can’t actually remember if Angela or Lillian won. He had been too focused on looking at Nancy and Jonathan until the very second he was allowed offstage. 

“Our mom didn’t go to prom.” Will says. Jonathan nods. 

“That’s why she made us take a million pictures.” 

“Well my mom took a million and one, and she _went_ to her’s.” Nancy shakes her head mournfully. 

It had been a lot of pictures, but Steve honestly didn’t care that much. He gets why Nancy and Jonathan had both groaned every time “just one more!” was repeated and why they both apologized afterwards, but his parents probably don’t even know that prom is tonight. They’ve both been in Chicago for two weeks. He thinks it’s kind of sweet that Joyce and Mrs. Wheeler both care so much about memorializing the whole thing, even if it’s just a dumb high school dance. It was a good night. You’re supposed to have pictures of a good night. 

At least he has the photo booth strip. And the yearbook pictures, but he almost certainly forgot to buy a yearbook. 

“When you guys go to prom, we’re going to take so many pictures you’ll probably end up missing the dance.” He informs the kids, hoping he can trick his brain into cheering up by harassing them. It works because Max immediately wrinkles her nose as if he’d just suggested they go dumpster diving. 

“I’m not going to prom.” She says firmly. Beside her, Lucas shrugs. 

“I don’t need to go. Erica can carry on the Sinclair prom legacy.”

“I want to go!” Dustin announces, almost jumping out of his chair completely. “I want to see El recreate _Carrie!”_

“Who is Carrie?” El asks. 

“That would mean we all die.”

“Obviously she would spare us, Mike, use your brain.”

Steve finishes his burger while they hotly debate whether or not the spirit of Carrie would still be intact if El decides to spare them. Steve decides not to point out that Carrie had a bucket of pig’s blood dumped on her. 

Nancy takes advantage of the kids being distracted to reach across the table and grab his hand, which Jonathan does too after Nancy elbows him. Steve is forced to abandon the last bite of his burger with both hands occupied, but he doesn’t care much. 

“Did you have fun, your majesty?” Nancy asks, having way too much fun with the king related teasing. 

“Yeah.” He says honestly. Even with the lack of documentation, Steve had fun at prom. He’s not sure why that’s so surprising. 

Chauffeur duties do not end just because it’s prom night. Steve had actually insisted on driving the kids home _because_ of prom night and all the drunken activity of his peers which he’s going to account for by waiting an extra five seconds before going at every green light. The only one being picked up is El, because Hopper’s shift coincidentally ends at just the right time and he’s going to use it as an excuse to get a milkshake. 

They’re sitting on the hood of his car in the parking lot when Hopper rolls up in the cruiser, makes them wait a little more while he goes inside and comes back with a styrofoam cup mysteriously in his hand, and the long painful goodbye between Mike and El officially starts despite the fact that they’re seeing each other tomorrow. 

“I feel underdressed.” Hopper says before reaching out and swiftly plucking Steve’s cigarette from between his lips. Steve protests with a whining noise from somewhere in the back of his throat that wasn’t entirely planned, but Hopper is relentless about making sure no one else smokes even if his next action is to pull out his own pack. He ignores Steve’s glare completely and addresses Nancy and Jonathan. “You have fun?”

“Yeah.” Jonathan answers for all three of them. “We thought it would be lame and it _was_ kinda lame but still fun.”

“We made it fun.” Nancy adds. 

“Harrington, what about you?” Hopper leans forward so he can see him from Nancy and Jonathan’s other side. 

“Yeah, it was good.” He says, unsure why Hopper needs individual feedback from all of them. He continues to be unsure because Hopper is looking at him contemplatively and he’s always had the power to stare directly through your mortal body and into your soul so it’s a bit unsettling the longer it goes on. 

Hopper finally stops scrutinizing him and the car tilts back up an inch or so when he gets up. Steve watches him open the driver’s door of his cruiser, reach in, and produce a camera that looks at least a few decades old. Without any explanation, Hopper positions himself in front of them and for some reason Nancy and Jonathan don’t question this at all, maybe because they live in households where at any minute a camera may be in your face. Nancy’s arm stretches around him and he takes the signal to just go with it and smile, which he does, and then there’s a sudden force barrelling into his side and nearly knocking him over. 

“Don’t take pictures without us!” Dustin admonishes before Steve can get him off. 

“Don’t break my ribs!” Steve retorts, watching every child flock over and immediately find their own place in the picture. 

El offers him the crown. “For the picture.”

“No way, Carrie.” He takes it and carefully places it on her head, brushing her curls back so they aren’t misplaced over her eyes. For some reason, when she’s wearing it, it almost looks reflective. El seems satisfied with being given the privilege and Steve is enjoying the moment until the car suddenly dips down with an expensive sounding creak because Max has climbed up and is now _standing_ on the hood. “Hey, holy shit! Don’t stand on my car!”

“I need to be tallest.” Max says, as if that makes sense at all or is an adequate reason to destroy a car. 

“You do not!”

“Can we take this sometime tonight?” Hopper calls, like this wasn’t his idea. 

“Off the car, Max, seriously.”

 _“Fine.”_ She huffs and then immediately grabs at both of his shoulders and begins the process of climbing on. At this point, Steve feels helpless to stop any of this from happening. So he waits until Max is safely on his shoulders, bats her hand away when she starts pulling at his hair, and looks up just in time for the flash. 

Max jumps down before he can safely lower himself and somehow lands alright. He turns to inspect the damage on his car, which thankfully is nothing more than a slight dent that he can probably pop back out, and when he turns back around Hopper is offering him a still dark Polaroid. 

“Joyce said you didn’t have anyone to take a picture.” He says, shaking it a little so Steve will get the hint and take it. “There you go. Prom night 1985.” 

Jonathan and Nancy look perfect, like always. Jonathan has one arm slung around Will, who’s laughing and looking at Lucas and Dustin re-enacting what appears to be a dramatic gunslinger showdown rather than the camera. Mike is looking annoyed at Nancy, who has her free arm pinning him against her while she smiles innocently. El is laughing with her crown perfectly positioned, the edge of her face blurred just slightly from movement. Max’s legs dangle over Steve’s nice suit jacket and her hands are grabbing at his hair for balance. He’s laughing. He didn’t realize he had been laughing. 

“Thanks.” He says, unable to say anything else because his throat is closing up for some reason. Hopper claps him on the shoulder and walks toward El and Mike, who are now redoing their goodbyes. 

He’s going to frame it. He’ll take one of the bland paintings of dreary gray skies and bland fields out of its frame, his parents won’t notice, and he’ll put this one in. Hang it in his room. He’ll write something in on the caption space. 

He’ll keep it. That’s what you do when you have a picture from a good night. 

 

Steve should have legally changed his name. 

He should have seen this coming, like, months ago, but honestly he’d never put much thought into the fine details of graduation. He’d always pictured the walking across stage part, not the waiting through the rest of the alphabet part. He’d pictured throwing the hat, not struggling to keep his hair looking good _under_ the hat. And he’d pictured listening to inspiring speeches by the valedictorian and the principle, not sitting next to Billy Fucking Hargrove during those speeches. 

Luckily on Billy Fucking Hargrove’s other side is Madison Harbinger, who cannot stop herself from putting her hand on Billy’s knee and laughing hysterically at everything he says. It keeps him distracted and less likely to make comments about how prom king is for...people he describes using a word that makes Steve want to knock his teeth out more than anything in the world. 

“Don’t punch him.” Max had said to Steve an hour ago, but at the time he’d thought she was talking about Mike because the little shit wouldn’t stop throwing Steve’s cap in the air “for practice” and failing to catch it every time. Apparently Max is smarter than him. But he already knew that. 

So, for Max, he doesn’t punch Billy Fucking Hargrove. He just sits there in sweltering heat and listens to the C’s being announced, and when parents cheer for their kids he tries not to think about how his parents are currently in Colorado. 

Apparently they tried. That’s what he keeps being told by his mother and his father’s secretary. They thought things would work out and they could come home from Chicago to attend, but then you know how business is, sometimes things come up and you have to adapt. You have to be fast on your feet. You have to miss your son’s graduation or else you might lose a new account or client or your appointment with an exclusive marriage counselor. 

And whatever. Steve shouldn’t care. They’ve been missing stuff for so many years that he’s stopped bothering to add dates to the calendar. 

It’s just that he _really_ thought this time. Sure they can miss basketball games and birthdays and prom because those are all sort of insignificant in the grand scheme of things. Games are just games (except when you lose, then they’re life or death) and birthdays are only important at twenty-one and prom is just a party. But graduation means something and even they can’t pretend it doesn’t. 

Maybe he wouldn’t care so much if he’d had a little warning. They called three hours ago. 

“William Hargrove.”

Huh, his middle name isn’t Fucking. 

“Steven Julian Harrington.”

The kids screech somewhere in the back rows, where non-family members have to sit. Steve thinks it’s a waste to make the kids sit all the way back there when his two parent-appointed chairs are left completely open but, whatever. No amount of explaining could possibly get the faculty of Hawkins High to understand and he could never pick amongst the kids for who gets the privilege of sitting closer. 

He bounds up the steps and shakes a bunch of hands which are sweaty, gross, and gets the paper thing and then it’s over. It’s so fast. Four years of his life and two monster fights and he’s just done like that, with no real plan now and no one sitting in the chairs--

Except there _are_ people sitting in the chairs. Hopper and Joyce. And they’re cheering for him even though it’s not his turn anymore (Hopper’s cheering is just clapping, but Joyce is actually still cheering while someone else’s name is called) and they’re _there._

The rest of the alphabet goes fast and Billy Fucking Hargrove whispers something about mommy and daddy’s money being a replacement for love or whatever, Steve misses it because he’s too busy thinking about how fucking glad he is that that’s true. If his parents were there, it would actually just suck. It would be the one event out of hundreds that they missed. 

Hopper and Joyce being there means they _want_ to be there. Because they could’ve not come and no one would know, Steve wouldn’t have expected it anyways, and things would have gone on smoothly but they still came. Sat through the whole alphabet in the heat. For him. 

“Steve you walked so slow!” Lucas yells from ten feet away and then quickly closes the ten feet to hug him with Dustin and El. Max and Mike are both more comfortable with high-fives, which even then Mike has to roll his eyes about, and Will is willing to wait and get his own hug so Steve’s ribs won’t cave in. 

“You did walk really slow.” Nancy confirms before planting a kiss on his cheek and then moving out of the way so Jonathan can do the same. 

“It wasn’t _that_ slow.” Jonathan assures him. “At least you didn’t fall.”

“Who fell?” 

“Well no one fell but at least you didn’t.”

“El was going to make Billy fall.” Max says. “But Hopper said not to do that.” 

“And Hopper was right.” Hopper’s voice comes from behind Steve and his hand comes down on his shoulder. “Good job, Harrington. How does it feel?” 

“Uh, it feels like I’ve been waking up at six every morning to get a piece of paper.” He receives a hug from Joyce which is surprisingly strong, but not strong like the kids who actively try to cave in his bones. Strong in a way that he can lean into. 

“This is so exciting!” She’s _beaming_ at him, her hand still on his arm after pulling away. Steve thinks she might be more excited about it than he is, but it’s hard to resist her enthusiasm and he can feel himself smiling back. “You did such a good job, sweetheart. So good.”

“You probably wouldn’t say that if you could see my final grades.” 

“Doesn’t matter.” She says firmly, her grip on his arm tightening just slightly. “You finished and that’s all that matters. Right?”

“Right.” He nods, more so she’ll take a breath than because he actually believes it. But really, if he thinks about it, she’s sort of right. He sucks at most classes besides gym, he doesn’t look forward to getting his grades the way Nancy does, he’s never able to stay focused on studying for longer than ten minutes at a time, but he _did_ finish. He could have given up at any time and no one would have been surprised. Or cared, really. Nancy would have been disappointed and that became his main reason for holding on during the last year, but pretty much every other classmate and teacher and even his parents probably expected it to some degree. 

Maybe his parents hadn’t scheduled in his graduation is because they didn’t really believe it was happening. Can he blame them for that?

“We’re going to eat at the cabin.” Hopper says, which Steve takes as an invitation despite the lack of asking if he’s free or willing to go. He must already know that Steve is both. He opts to ride in Joyce’s car with Nancy, Jonathan, and Will which results in Hopper looking minutely betrayed when he’s left alone in the cruiser with the rest of the kids, who won’t stop yelling because they all told Mike they were going to ditch their graduation before reaching the W’s and he could just meet up with them later.

The argument is still going on fifteen minutes later when they arrive at the cabin. Mike is now declaring that he’ll just legally change his name and usurp Will as the first to graduate. Hopper decides to take revenge on Steve for choosing the quiet car by forcing him to “learn how to grill” which actually just means standing at the grill and watching the meat sizzle between watching the kids run around in the grass and hurl water balloons at each other with enough force to break someone’s nose. 

It takes five minutes of psyching himself up before Steve finally manages to say, “Thanks for coming.”

“No problem. Flip that one in the corner, it’s done.”

Steve manages to flip the burger without giving himself third degree burns, which is pretty good considering his cooking experience consists entirely of instant noodles. Now that the thanking is done, he can officially move on from graduation and his parents not being there and just live with the happy memory of seeing the seats not be empty, but he can’t. He has to know. 

“Why did you come? I mean it was awesome, seriously, it was really great but just--?”

“What year was it you broke your ankle at that basketball game? Two years ago or three?”

Steve has to think about it for a second, startled by the memory. He’s not sure how Hopper even knows about that considering it’s been long forgotten in his own mind amidst the several broken bones and concussions and other sport-related injuries since then. “Uh, three. I was a Sophomore.”

“Sometimes when it’s a slow night and there’s a big event like that, I’ll send someone to be a glorified security guard. Make sure none of the parents are getting too worked up over the game and all that.” Hopper takes the spatula from him and flips another three burgers in quick succession. “And it _was_ a slow night and the game was a big deal for some reason--”

“We were against Silverton.”

“Right, yeah. So I went because I didn’t have anything better to do and I could at least go into the parking lot and smoke. That’s what I was doing when you fell. When I came back in there was so much commotion that I thought maybe some idiot had swung at someone on the court, y’know, like stupid high school kids do. I went over there and saw that it was just an injury and I thought, alright, not my business then. I was about to leave and then your coach stopped me and said, this kid doesn’t have parents in town to take him to the hospital, would you be willing to take him, and I said no.”

He’s quiet for a second and Steve focuses on the grill sizzling and water balloons popping and the kids yelling. He desperately tries to recall seeing Hopper there that night, but his attention had been taken up by the fact that his entire right leg had bolts of pain shooting up it while Silverton had time to strategize for the third quarter. 

“I figured it wasn’t my job. I didn’t have any kids anymore. I just wanted to go home and drink a beer and not have to deal with anything. Which is exactly what I did, and I never once felt bad about it until you showed up again and you made sure those kids didn’t die while El closed the gate.”

“You shouldn’t feel bad. I mean it wasn’t a big deal, they called an ambulance anyways and it was fine.”

“It’s not how you got there.” Hopper hands him the spatula again. “It’s who you got there with, which I’m pretty sure was nobody. That shouldn’t happen anymore. Flip the corners.”

Steve flips the corners. He remembers getting his ankle wrapped in blue plaster when he was fifteen all because some Silverton asshole body-checked him on defense and being glad his father _wasn’t_ there because he would only get mad about the game. 

He’d never considered the possibility of anyone else being there. Not until now.

 

“Hey, Steve, are you cold?”

He has to think about it for a minute. First, he has to think about what the question means. Then once he’s figured that out, he has to think about the answer. _Is_ he cold? It’s summer so he shouldn’t be, but yeah. There’s cold air coming from the ambulance and he’s sitting on the back of it so the cold air is getting all over him and making him cold. Mystery solved. 

“Yeah.” 

“Alright, help him get this on.”

Someone grabs his arm and gently lifts. They guide it through the sleeve of a navy blue jacket, which honestly Steve could’ve done himself. He tries to inform them of this, and all he gets in response is an exasperated scoff. His brain is instantly able to recognize it as Jonathan’s. 

“You can’t even hold the bat right now.” Jonathan says, now done with helping him get the jacket on. He comes into Steve’s limited view of the Starcourt parking lot (turning his head hurts so directly in front of him is all he’s got) and frowns. He has a cut on his cheek that’s still bleeding. Why is no one fixing that? And once he processes what Jonathan just said, another very urgent question comes up. 

“Where’s the kids?” He sits upright, which hurts. “Where’s Nancy?”

“The kids are alright, Nancy is with them, everything’s fine.”

The last thing that Steve remembers being fine was work earlier today, and even then it had been full of annoying customers getting mad that they were out of chocolate syrup. Steve clearly remembers telling Robin that he was going on break, and then after that everything is a foggy mess of getting grabbed by guys way stronger than him and ending up somewhere with metal doors and struggling not to get a needle stabbed into his neck, which clearly he was not successful in doing because now his brain is going much slower than usual. 

A few months back he might’ve thought that sleeping through a monster crisis would be nice, but now he’s certain that waking up and getting only brief descriptions of what happened is worse. Especially when his mind can’t hold onto anything for longer than a minute at a time. 

In fact, he remembers suddenly that Hopper had already told him everyone was okay. That was when he first got dragged onto the back of the ambulance. How long ago was that? Either twenty minutes or seven hours. Somewhere in there. 

“I mean they’re banged up, but they’re okay. El is exhausted from having to make that giant tentacle thing explode but she’s alright. That’s where Hopper went, to put her in the car with my mom. Nancy is with the kids. I think Lucas might have broken his wrist.”

“His slingshot wrist?”

“I don’t know. Don’t you need both wrists to shoot a slingshot?”

“Do you?”

“Yes. Steve, seriously, lean back.”

“The cut on your cheek is kind of hot. Well like _it’s_ not hot but it makes _you_ look hot.”

“Your filter is just gone, huh?”

Talking is helping. Even if his filter is gone, his mind is starting to process information faster and he doesn’t have to think about each individual word Jonathan is saying. When Hopper comes back after a few minutes of Steve leaning his head on Jonathan’s shoulder (after Jonathan teleported from in front of him to beside him, because his brain isn’t quite ready to process sudden movements yet) he can actually distinguish what’s happening. Hopper is returning from putting El in Joyce’s car. 

And then while he’s watching Hopper get closer, someone else starts walking over with his eyes locked on Steve. His _father._ He can’t distinguish why this is happening and it isn’t because of the drugs. 

“Dad?” He sits up quickly, a little too quickly probably because he almost loses his balance and tips off the ambulance before Jonathan grabs him. He looks at Jonathan, who appears lost. “You see my dad too, right?”

“I’ve never met your dad. But I see a guy in a suit coming over here looking pissed.”

“Yeah, good. I think my brain might be working again.”

His father beats Hopper by a few strides and stops in front of Steve with his arms crossed. He doesn’t even acknowledge Jonathan, who’s all tensed up either because his own father fucking sucks and he’s on alert when dealing with all of his species, or because Steve’s dad is kind of the most intimidating person ever. The suit, the crossed arms, the stony expression. Steve has no idea what’s going on but it can’t be good.

“This is what happens.” His father says. The worst thing about fighting with his father is that he never yells or even gets all scary-quiet like Nancy does when she’s pissed about something. He just sounds entirely indifferent. Like he doesn’t care in the slightest. “I told you this job was a waste of time and energy, that you needed to come work for somewhere _respectable.”_

He spits that word out while looking at Steve’s work uniform with disdain which, yeah it’s ugly and gaudy and embarrassing but it’s no prison jumpsuit. His father turns to regard Hopper, who has very suddenly closed the distance that Steve last saw him at, and just like Jonathan he spares him no more than a quick glance. 

“And look what it got you.” His father now grabs at Steve’s chin and tilts his head in either direction to assess the damage done to his face. Steve doesn’t know how bad it looks, but it’s around the same levels of pain from last time the monsters were around so it can’t be good. “I don’t know what happened in there, Steven, but whatever it was should have had _nothing_ to do with our family.”

Now the indifference is actual anger and Steve can’t figure out why. His dad doesn’t know what actually happened and never will because there’ll just be another cover story to keep up with, like the last two times. For all he knows, Starcourt could’ve been bombed or some shit. And he’s mad at _Steve?_

“Fuck you.” He says. Jonathan tenses even more and Hopper steps forward, edging in like he might have to break up a fight. Maybe he will because his father’s eyes widened before narrowing and his jaw is clenched and he looks beyond a level of pissed that Steve has ever seen, but the drugs _really_ did a number on his brain because he continues, “You missed my fucking graduation! I graduated high school and you didn’t come! I went to prom and I don’t even think you knew about it unless you saw the charge for the suit on my card!”

“I don’t see how your high school parties are relevant right now.” Now his father _is_ acknowledging Jonathan and Hopper. He’s hyper-aware of everyone around them, all the onlookers and paramedics and people too busy reuniting from being trapped in the death mall to even care about Harrington family affairs. Because it’s all he cares about. Who sees what. Who sees Steve Harrington tarnishing the family name by causing a scene in a sailor suit. 

“They were important to me! And they aren’t parties, they’re like, events in my life that you missed! You know who didn’t miss them? _Hopper._ He’s been around more in the past month you have since I was six!”

His father looks at Hopper, who looks back calmly. It’s the first time Steve has ever seen his father scramble for something to say and eventually he decides to ignore Hopper entirely and simply respond, “You never once mentioned any of this to me or your mother.”

“I shouldn’t have to, oh my _God!_ You should just know, you’re supposed to know that attending your kid’s graduation is important. No one should have to fucking spell it out for you. You would know that if you were _ever_ around or if you ever paid attention to me.”

He feels kind of dizzy and this time Jonathan must be too shocked to react quickly enough because he _does_ lose his balance and tilt off the ambulance. Someone’s arms grab him before he can hit the gravel and help steady him until his legs solidify again. He knows who it is before opening his eyes. 

His dad has taken several steps back. Hopper helps him lean back against the ambulance. 

“If you think I’m going home with you,” Steve tells his father through slightly uneven breathing, “you’re fucking crazy.”

He doesn’t even argue. He just takes one last frenzied look in every direction, trying to see how many people heard and how much damage has been done, and then he turns and leaves. Cuts right through a crowd of people clinging to each other. People reuniting.

“Okay, kid, you’re alright.” Hopper pats his shoulder. Jonathan’s hand is on the side of his face, his thumb brushing away tears that Steve didn’t notice until this very instant. His expression is gentle and sympathetic and understanding because he gets it too. 

“The filter.” Steve mumbles and realizes for the first time that the jacket he’s wearing says Hawkins Police Department on the sleeve. “It’s like, really gone.”

“I think that was overdue.” Hopper squeezes his shoulder and doesn’t let go. “And, y’know, we’ve got a couch at the cabin. Even if you need it for more than one night.”

His place of employment is currently being invaded by a SWAT team. There’s blood all over his stupid uniform that he’d put up with only because he’d wanted a job that wasn’t handed to him and controlled by his father. His neck is astonishingly sore in one specific spot which is probably where the needle went in when the evil scientists who keep letting monsters out in his town drugged him. He just cussed out his father.

But he has a couch waiting for him, so it all seems alright.

**Author's Note:**

> this is for em the love of my life who just posted her brilliant fic written under our shared prompt of family dynamics over on @floralathena so go READ IT and COMMENT ON IT and follow her on tumblr @discosteves
> 
> the title is from "this was a home once" by bad suns! follow me on tumblr @bi-harrington! thanks!


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